Page:Correspondence of Marcus Cornelius Fronto volume 1 Haines 1919.djvu/19

 mind and powers in general, and his theory of rhetorical art in particular. They labour under the limitation of having been mostly written to pupils, and chiefly in connexion with their studies. They are of a private, domestic, and professional nature, and coloured by the relationship between a courtly master and his royal scholars.

The early editors of the book, who were disappointed with the nature and contents of the work, had no good word to say for it or its author, but their indignation and contempt were certainly not justified. The volume was well worth recovering and is here presented to the English reader for the first time.

On discovering the MS. in 1815, Mai, the librarian of the Ambrosian Library at Milan, lost no time in producing his first edition of it. But the work was done too hastily and carelessly. He also seems to have injured the MS. by a too free use of reagents to bring out the faded characters.

Becoming librarian of the Vatican library a few years later, Mai found a second volume containing more leaves of the original Fronto Codex. These he published with the previous portion in 1823. The Vatican leaves being in better condition than the xi